Designing the Indoor Environment

Designing the Indoor Environment

Indoor Environments That Foster Creativity and Arts-Based Learning

Designing the indoor environment for creativity and arts-based learning begins with knowing the children, what they need to learn, and how they best can learn. The next consideration includes four interlocking environments—the physical, social, cognitive, and digital environments—that together support children’s creative growth and arts-based learning (Copple & Bredekamp, 2009; Kuh, 2014; Saracho, 2012). The physical environment includes such arrangements as furniture placement, accessibility of stimulating materials, pathways, and large- and small-group meeting and work areas. It must be a safe place to be and provide novel and flexible opportunities for creating. There is also the social environment that involves interactions among the people. It includes the kinds of relationships, respect, and acceptance of individuals, families, and communities that children experience as well as children’s culture and language. The cognitive environment includes those learning experiences, materials, and opportunities that enhance creativity. It focuses on the knowledge, skills, and abilities children need to acquire in order to think and behave creatively. And the digital environment is a simulated, virtual place accessed through computers. It uses various technology tools, websites, and devices to access virtual worlds through which children learn and develop. How these four environments are designed directly affects children’s creativity and arts-based learning.

Classroom environments that value curiosity and eagerness to learn provide children with a balance of self-selected, self-directed, and teacher-selected activities. The following section describes two important components of indoor environments that nurture creativity and the arts: room arrangement and arts-based centers.

Room Arrangement

Room arrangement refers to the way space is organized. It can be planned, such as the art center and the areas around it, or unplanned, such as a cubbyhole between two shelving units that attracts children. Room arrangement affects children’s creativity, productivity, and interactions with one another and with materials (Bullard, 2014; Copple & Bredekamp, 2009; Jacobs & Crowley, 2007; Kuh, 2014).

Designing the Indoor Environment

When arranging space for creative experiences, keep in mind the following:

1. The environment communicates expectations. If you are invited to dinner, you would behave differently at a cookout with paper plates and plastic utensils from a formal dinner party with china, silver, and crystal. Room arrangement works in the same way. Well-organized, carefully arranged space dictates how children may behave, interact, and use materials, and affects their work pace. It fosters self-regulation and student engagement, which creativity and arts-based learning require. In contrast, poorly organized space invites interruptions, decreases children’s attention spans, increases the likelihood of conflicts, and demands more teacher direction.

2. Space must be easy to supervise. Teachers need to be able to scan the room from all vantage points. In this way, you can facilitate children’s behaviors that support learning goals and redirect those that do not. It is equally important to distinguish between the child’s and the adult’s environment. Adults and children view their surroundings from different perspectives. Both usually attend to what is at their eye level.

3. Materials must be accessible, appropriate, and easy to use. Make sure you have plenty of shelves so that children can reach and see the materials that are there. One preschool teacher arranged the manipulative materials such as large Tinkertoys and shape sorters along low, open shelves that face a carpeted area away from traffic flow. Because children need a lot of floor space to play with them, this teacher provided the space for them to do so. She made her appropriate materials accessible and easy to use, which enhanced children’s sense of ownership, encouraged creative problem-solving, and fostered exchanges of materials from one part of the classroom to another.

4. Be alert to traffic patterns. Clear pathways provide for a smooth and easy flow of traffic throughout the room. When centers are too close to one another or crowded around the outside of the room, children cannot freely move among them. To maintain freedom of movement that keeps children focused on their creative processes, paths should not be used for any other purpose. Unclear paths often distract children on their way to a space or lead children to intrude in others’ ongoing activities and concentration.

Room arrangement is a powerful environmental tool that affects children’s creativity. Figure 9.3 shows room arrangements for three age groups: toddlers, preschoolers/kindergartners, and children in grades 1 to 4. You can also download free PDF guides for room plans for children from birth through age 5 by going to the website for Environments and choosing planning guides.

Figure 9.3 Room Arrangements

This video describes seven principles of design for creating inspiring and inviting spaces for children. How does Principle 3, Furnishings Define Space, affect children’s creative thinking? What other principles capture your attention?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RD9XOow20E

ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS

Discussion Questions (DQ)

• Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words.
• Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source.
• One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words.
• I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses.

Weekly Participation

• Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately.
• In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies.
• Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work).
• Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week.

APA Format and Writing Quality

• Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required).
• Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation.
• I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition.

Use of Direct Quotes

• I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly.
• As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content.
• It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source.

LopesWrite Policy

• For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me.
• Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes.
• Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own?
• Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score.

Late Policy

• The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies.
• Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances.
• If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect.
• I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension.
• As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading.

Communication

• Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me:
  • Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class.
  • Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours.